PLATTSBURGH, N.Y. – The Plattsburgh State men's ice hockey team faced its toughest home match to date when No. 12 Potsdam came into the Stafford Ice Arena in a clash of undefeated teams. However, that would come to an end for Potsdam after the Cardinals ran the Bears out of the arena with a 7-1 shellacking.
 
The Cardinals jumped on the board 4:04 into the game when Nick Belger barred one in off the draw on a power play.
 
Plattsburgh State would make it 2-0 when Cole Stallard found the back of the net less than two minutes later, again on the man advantage. Stallard dropped a pass in the slot to Brandon O'Quinn whose shot was saved but Stallard was there to clean it up.
 
The flood gates would open with under a minute left in the first period when Plattsburgh State had back-to-back tallies within eight seconds of each other.
 
First was Dillan Fox netting his third before Kevin Emmerling crashed the net to score his team-high seventh goal, making it 4-0 after one.
 
In the second, Stallard would get on the board again with another power play goal ticking it off the post and in.
 
Potsdam would get its lone goal 5:24 into the second period as Billy Pascalli beat senior goaltender Spencer Finney to make it 5-1.
 
With 9:41 off the board in the third period, Stallard would finish off his hat trick performance sniping one over the far shoulder of Bears goaltender Brendan McMenimen. That would end the night for McMenimen as Nate Skidmore would come on in relief.
 
Ayrton Valente would make it 7-1 with another Cardinal power play goal on wrister inside the blueline that beat Skidmore.
 
Finney would finish with 21 saves on 22 shots for the Cardinals while McMenimen made 26 saves on 32 shots before giving way to Skidmore who finished up with 11 saves on 12 shots.
 
The Cardinals were excellent on special teams all night, going 4-for-5 on the power play while only giving up one man advantage to Potsdam all night.

Plattsburgh State remains unbeaten on the year, moving to 6-0-0 (5-0-0 SUNYAC). The Cardinals sit in the driver's seat in the SUNYAC standings as they are the last undefeated team in the conference. Potsdam suffers its first loss, slipping to 6-1-0 (6-1-0 SUNYAC), but remain on top of the SUNYAC standings with 12 points.
 
Next, the Cardinals will travel to Norwich to take on Middlebury on Friday at 4 p.m. in the 18th annual PrimeLink Great Northern ShootOut.